A while back, I made a liver and onions picatta dish, and it got me craving more calves liver. Which is hilarious because I love calves liver already. When I made that picatta dish, I went with lighter flavors, using a lot of acid, capers, and caramelized onions for a more dainty feel/contrast. So I…
Tag: Cooking
Pork and Mushroom Chowder
This is the perfect dish to embrace two of my favorite savory ingredients in pork belly and mushrooms. Even before I lived in Boston, I always liked chowder for some reason. The idea of a warm, creamy soup with fun, random ingredients running through it was just reminded me of congee, but super Westernized. That…
Kimchi Chicken Cacciatorre with Kale Polenta
This dish was really meant to be a homey meal, hence why it kind of looks like a giant pile of slop in a bowl. Those kinds of dishes are indicative of the fall/winter, being super cozy, comforting dishes that are ugly-delicious. In this case, I wanted to do chicken cacciatorre, an Italian dish consisting…
Lamb Stew with Yogurt Dumplings
This lamb stew came about because I got a bone-less leg of lamb, and was kind of struggling to figure out what to do with it. You see, if the meat came with the bone, I could make a gorgeous lamb stock, or even a meat pie. And the bone itself would be able to…
Roasted Chicken Thighs with Chorizo Chickpeas
This dish is the perfect thing to eat on a cold, rainy dish. I made these chorizo-stewed chickpeas because I wanted this hearty, comforting stew. What I love from a textural contrast standpoint is that there are smoky chorizo bits and nutty, creamy chickpeas, swimming in a slightly spicy broth. That when paired with a…
Figs, Aerated Kefir, and Poached Egg Salad
So I won’t lie, this was basically a re-hashed plated dish version of the fig-arugula flatbread I made before, but instead of mascarpone-feta, I made an aerated kefir(drinkable yogurt), and replaced the flatbread with brioche soldiers. Oh, and I put a poached egg in there, just to add more richness. What initially inspired this dish…
Pork and Cabbage Potstickers
I will never live down getting sent home in Masterchef: Back to Win over dumplings. I literally teach dumpling classes, so it’s actually traumatic, even if the filling for my potstickers weren’t traditional(and before anyone asks, hell no would I ever go back to Masterchef to try to redeem myself on these, because honestly, they’d…
Fig-Prosciutto Flatbread
Whenever I think of figs in a savory dish, prosciutto and cheese immediately come to mind. I’m not one to shy away from a charcuterie board – honestly, one of my favorite combinations is a punchy cheese, a cold cut, and the fig jam. So in a lot of ways, this flatbread pays homage to…
Breakfast Patty Melt
I’m not sure how truly breakfast-y these patty melts are, but they do contain eggs, bacon, and toast, so that has to count for something, right? I love making shokupan sandwiches(I usually get my shokupan from my local Japanese bakery when I’m not baking a loaf up myself), since the bread is so light, and…
Grilled Romaine with Sesame Dressing
Brown butter-grilled romaine is my favorite savory discovery in 2025. Brown butter adds a toasty, nutty flavor to anything, and when you grill romaine with it, you get this smoky, crispy, crunchy lettuce that is super addictive. While my home’s ventilation system hates me whenever I break out my grill pan for this, brown butter-grilled…
Meat and Potatoes: a plated dish
Whenever I think of meat and potatoes, steak and mashed potatoes come to mind right away. I almost immediately picture this quintessential dish of a giant slab of red meat with a pile of home fries. I wanted to slightly change that up, by doing potatoes two ways, and trim down the portion to be…
Kale Crespelles with Mushrooms and Hazeluts
This dish has been on my to-make list for ages. I always loved the combination of hazelnut, brown butter, and thyme, mostly because it is woodsy and earthy. While I usually make desserts with that flavor combination, it made just as much sense to do something savory with it as well(since it is an inherently…
Pork Loin and Fennel Salad
This dish is a loose homage to a vitello tonnato. Vitello tonnato is an Italian dish consisting of thinly sliced chilled veal loin with a creamy tuna mayonnaise sauce, usually served with capers, lemon, and parsley. It’s basically a meat salad. I wanted to do something similar to that, but in this case, with pork…
Grilled Pork Loin with Apple Nuoc Cham
This dish came about after I realized I still had 2 whole heads of romaine lettuce, and I was sick of eating a chopped salad. When it comes to lettuce, I had some semi-traumatic experiences as a child since my mom would serve us boiled lettuce. What you don’t think about when it comes to…
Koji Sirloin with Miso Risotto
This recipe is my East Meets West take on steak and risotto. I wanted to make a risotto with steak and kale, which is something we might eat for dinner for a special occasion, but using some Japanese ingredients to give it a new identity and keep things new and different. So with the steak,…
Liver and Onion Piccata
I am one of those weirdos that likes liver and onions, okay? Back in college, when I was learning Montenegrin food, I noticed liver was a commonly used protein in that cuisine. I still remember when I was auditioning for Masterchef season 10, since I mentioned being a heavy baker more than a savory cook,…
Chorizo Chicken Thighs with Cavatelli
A while ago, I was trying to make a dish with chorizo, but accidentally grabbed Mexican chorizo instead of Spanish chorizo. To confirm the differences here, Mexican chorizo is more like a mince or sausage meat, meant to be cooked to be crumbly. Spanish chorizo is dried and is more like a cured meat product…
Eggs, Bacon, and Toast Gnocchi
When I think of Americana, I just randomly think of that scene in Parks and Rec where the Gergich family is singing about eggs, bacon, and toast. So I figured, why not take that inspiration, and making a gnocchi dish? Originally, when I was conceptualizing this dish, it was going to be a pasta dish…
Creamy Koji-Stewed Chicken Thighs
I happened to buy a gigantic bag of bone-in chicken thighs, but I ran into a bit of a hiccup when it came time to actually cooking some of them. I was already marinating the thighs in a mixture of soy sauce and koji, but I forgot to buy frier oil(I was originally going to…
Roast Duck with Purple Yam and Radicchio
When I was thinking of a main course to serve my mom, the tricky part was the protein. Half the menu was fruit/vegetable-focused, while I also had a soup course that used poultry in the form of black chicken. I knew in terms of proteins, my mom would either want a fish, duck, or lamb,…
Freddy's Harajuku 